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UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS AT URBANA-CHAMPAIGN
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University of Illinois at
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Technical Report No. 551
MULTIETHNIC LITERATURE:
HOLDING FAST TO DREAMS
Kathryn Meyer Reimer
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
March 1992
Center for the Study of Reading
TECHNICAL
REPORTS
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College of Education
UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS AT URBANA-CHAMPAIGN
174 Children's Research Center
51 Gerty Drive
Champaign, Illinois 61820
CENTER FOR THE STUDY OF READING
Technical Report No. 551
MULTIETHNIC LITERATURE:
HOLDING FAST TO DREAMS
Kathryn Meyer Reimer
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
March 1992
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
51 Gerty Drive
Champaign, Illinois 61820
The work upon which this publication was based was supported in part by the
Office of Educational Research and Improvement under Cooperative Agreement
No. G0087-C1001-90 with the Reading Research and Education Center. The
publication does not necessarily reflect the views of the agency supporting the
research.
1991-92 Editorial Advisory Board
James Armstrong
Barbara J. Hancin-Bhatt
Diana Beck
Richard Henne
Stacy Birch
Carole Janisch
Diane Bottomley
Bonnie M. Kerr
Clark A. Chinn
Raymond Langley
Judith Davidson
Jane Montes
Irene-Anna N. Diakidoy
Marty Waggoner
Colleen P. Gilrane
Janelle Weinzierl
Hwajin Yi
MANAGING EDITOR
Fran Lehr
MANUSCRIPT PRODUCTION ASSISTANT
Delores Plowman
Meyer Reimer
Multiethnic Literature - 1
Abstract
The first part of this report surveys the past 25 years of the publishing of multiethnic literature-documenting trends and analyzing the content of the books that have been published. The second part
surveys trade books and basal series currently used in schools for their inclusion of stories and
illustrations featuring different ethnic groups. Finally, six issues are raised: the predominance of
European-American authors writing about people of color, the ethnically nondistinctive child in
illustrations, hypersensitivity, cultural grouping, the possibility of a canon of children's literature that
includes multiethnic books, and the limited number of multiethnic books being published.
Meyer Reimer
Multiethnic Literature - 2
MULTIETHNIC LITERATURE:
HOLDING FAST TO DREAMS
Hold fast to dreams
For if dreams die
Life is a broken-winged bird
That cannot fly.
Hold fast to dreams
For when dreams go
Life is a barren field
Frozen with snow.
-Langston Hughes
"Just look around this library. You don't ever see books about kids like us." (African-American fifthgrade girl)
"The whites get boards and boards throughout the year and we only get half a board in February."
(African-American eighth-grade boy)
"You mean Martin Luther King was a Black dude?" (European-American sixth-grade boy)
Although these children's comments reflect the lack of children's literature by and about people of color,
they also illustrate the importance of making such literature available to all children. In this report, I
examine the existing research to determine how much and what kind of multiethnic literature for
children is being published. I then report on an investigation I conducted of the books on three lists
widely used by teachers and parents in selecting trade books for children and of the stories in two basal
reading programs to determine the status of the multiethnic literature elementary school children are
reading. I conclude with a discussion of several important issues raised in this investigation.
Multiethnic Children's Literature: How Much and What Kind
It has been more than 25 years since Nancy Larrick's article, "The All-White World of Children's
Books," appeared in Saturday Review. The article, which focused on the shortage of African-American
representation in children's literature, documented that of 5,200 children's books published from 1962
to 1964, only 349 (6.7%) included an African-American in the text or illustrations. Only 47 (0.9%) of
the books published had African-Americans represented in contemporary settings.
Librarians had been decrying the lack of representation of people of color in children's books since the
1920s (Harris, 1990); Larrick's article was the first to bring the situation to a wider audience through
the popular press.
In 1975, Chall, Radwin, French, and Hall (1975) replicated Larrick's study with books published from
1973 to 1975. Their intent was to document whether African-American representation had improved
since the 1960s. They found that 689 (14.4%) of 4,775 books published included an African-American
character in the illustration or text. This was a 100% increase over the 1964 statistic (although 85.6%
of the books still included no African-American characters in their text or illustrations). Twenty-eight
books (4% of the books published during those years) portrayed African-Americans in contemporary
settings, double the percentage Larrick had found.
Meyer Reimer
Multiethnic Literature - 3
However, this increase was short-lived. In 1984, when Rollock updated her 1979 annotated bibliography
entitled The Black Experience in Children's Books, she found that while over 2,000 new books had been
published yearly for children between 1979 and 1984, only 100 new titles (1.5%) concerned the AfricanAmerican experience. This was on average 25 new publications a year. In addition, many of the titles
that had been listed in the 1979 edition were out of print by 1984. Rollock's 1984 edition was half the
size of the 1979 edition, leading her to comment:
The volumes of material on the African-American experience for children which were
available in the late 1960s and early 1970s have dwindled to a trickle of titles by the
same familiar authors. The social consciousness the Civil Rights Movement, once
aroused, now seems dormant and has receded to the passive quiet of the years prior
to the 1960s. (p. 4)
By the mid-1980s, only 1% of the children's literature published was about African-Americans; even less
about Asian-Americans, Hispanics, and Native Americans (Bishop, 1987). According to the New York
Public Library's The Black Experience in Children'sLiterature (1989), a bibliography of African-American
literature, about 34 titles a year were published with African-American characters or illustrations
between 1984 and 1988. A recent survey by Bishop (1991) indicates that currently, less than 2% of the
2,500 to 3,500 children's books published each year are about African-Americans.
As we entered the 1990s, Bishop (1991) was optimistic that despite the significant decrease in books
about African-Americans in the 1980s, the numbers were rising again. In contrast, Hopkins (1990), an
anthologizer of poetry for children, has argued that the situation is not improving dramatically:
It is a fact: Eloise Greenfield is the only Black writer of children's poetry currently
being published in the United States; her latest volume, Nathaniel Talking (Black
Butterfly Children's Books) appeared in 1989.
It seems quite incredible that, with over four thousand books for children being
published annually, America is not seeing work produced by Black poets.
It is disturbing that such work is not more visible or readily available to educators and
children of all races.
Poetry about the Black experience continues to dwindle. (p. 388)
Although quantity is a clear indicator of the status of multiethnic children's literature, it does not address
the issue of what kind of literature is available for different ethnic groups. To get at that issue, I will
look at what the research says about the content of books about African-Americans, Hispanics, AsianAmericans, and Native Americans.
Children's Literature and the African-American Experience
In a 1975 study of African-American children's literature, Mills found that the major theme of the 24
picture books published during 1974 and 1975 tended to be love/understanding for others across races.
Of these 24 books, 8 were folktales, and there was a wide range in length and subject matter in the
fiction. In some of the books, the main characters were involved in child-like activities; in others, they
were involved in gangs and violence. There was an unusually high number (24) of biographies of
African-Americans for elementary school children, a welcome addition to the literature for that age
group because they offered role models and a sense of identity. The 22 biographies published for older
children did not provide the breadth of role models found in the biographies for younger children -- they
were almost exclusively biographies about athletes.
Meyer Reimer
Multiethnic Literature - 4
Rollock (1984) noted a similar trend in the 1980s.
The biography section features more accounts of athletes or sports figures. Their
stories remain in print long after their playing . . . careers [have] ended, and they far
outnumber biographies of Black scientists, artists, civic leaders and others who have
contributed to society as a whole. (p. 4)
In her 1982 study of 150 realistic fiction books about African-Americans, Sims found that realistic fiction
during the 1970s focused on:
(1) the importance of warm and loving human relationships, especially within the
family; (2) a sense of community among African-Americans; (3) African-American
history, heritage, and culture; (4) a sense of continuity; and (5) the ability to survive,
both physically and psychologically, in the face of overwhelming odds. (p. 560)
Bishop (1990, 1991) has noted both an increase in the amount of African-American literature being
published and a shift in the content in recent years. She has found more African-American folktales,
more picture books retelling family stories and family histories, more books for the very young with
African-American characters, and more books that include people from the Caribbean. Biographies
continue to be published in significant numbers. In addition to biographies of athletes, these books
include folk heros, historical figures, and current political figures, such as John Henry, Martin Luther
King, Paul Robeson, Jesse Jackson, and Malcolm X.
Children's Literature and the Hispanic Experience
Hispanic children's literature is complex to document because the term Hispanic does not refer to one
culture but to a conglomerate of Central and South American cultures, each distinct from the others.
Puerto Rican literature, for example, is not representative of Mexican-American literature, which is not
representative of Salvadoran literature. For this reason, bibliographies tend to categorize books by
country of origin (Nieto, 1982a, 1982b; Schon, 1980).
Analyzing the 100 children's books available about the Puerto Rican experience available in 1972, Nieto
(1982a) found that all were "pervaded by sexism, racism, and ethnocentric colonialism" (p. 6). In
addition, most of these books were written about Puerto Ricans, not by them. Of the 56 books about
Puerto Ricans published between 1972 and 1982, Nieto recommended 8, she had reservations about 10
others, and the rest she considered to be seriously flawed. The primary theme of these books was
assimilation into the culture of the United States. Though only one half of the Puerto Ricans living in
the United States are in cities (primarily New York), most of the books were set in urban ghettos, the
characters were frequently caricatures, there was no indication of physical diversity among Puerto
Ricans, classism was pervasive, women were ignored, and Puerto Ricans were portrayed as helpless and
passive and the cause of their own oppression.
Many of the books were retellings of folktales or stories from an author's childhood memories. The
folktales, with the exception of the tales retold by Pura Belpre (e.g., Perez and Martina, 1960; Dance of
the Animals, 1965), were often retold by someone who was not Puerto Rican. Poetry, which is often
read or recited as an integral part of any Puerto Rican social occasion, is noticeably absent in Hispanic
children's literature. In fact, books of Hispanic poetry are rare. In April 1989, Scholastic did publish
a new book of Latin American songs and rhymes called Arroz con Leche (Delacre, 1989), and Las
Navidades (Delacre, 1990) followed in 1990.
Books published from the mid-1980s to 1990 continued to center on large urban areas and focus on the
author's childhood memories. Contemporary books about Mexican Americans are rare. Schon
published a bibliography of notable books currently available on the Hispanic experience (1989). The
list is short--15 non-fiction and 4 folktales or legends. The Hispanic population, though one of the
Meyer Reimer
Multiethnic Literature - 5
largest and fastest growing populations in the United States, continues to be poorly represented in
children's literature.
Children's Literature and the Asian-American Experience
As with Hispanic culture, there is not one Asian-American culture. Chinese, Japanese, Koreans,
Taiwanese, Laotians, Vietnamese, Cambodians, and Filipinos all have distinct cultures, traditions, and
literary heritages. In the most recent comprehensive bibliography of Asian-American literature (Jenkins
& Austin, 1987), each nationality is discussed separately, but in all traditions, the emphasis in children's
literature has been on folktales, myths, and legends. Scott (1980) suggests that the reason for this might
be that literature for children did not exist in Asian cultures until the nineteenth century. Before that,
ancient and familiar stories were told by story tellers and usually intended for adults.
As with Hispanic literature, most of the tales are written about Asians rather than by Asians. In the
past 10 years, there has been an increase in the number of books about the Asian experience in
America, usually written by Asian-Americans about their own assimilation experiences or remembrances
as children in the United States. Lord's In the Year of the Boar and Jackie Robinson (1984), the story
of a recent immigrant from China and her acculturation to life in the United States, and Uchida's
Journey Home (1980), the story of a Japanese girl's experiences in California after returning from a
concentration camp in which she had been held during World War II, are assimilation and childhood
memories stories. With the exception of a few books such as Ba-Nam (Lee, 1987), the story of the
traditions of Thanh-Minh Day when families visit their ancestor's graves in Vietnam, and Tuan (BoholmOlsson, 1984), few books had appeared from Vietnamese, Cambodian, and Laotian cultures by the end
of the 1980s.
Children's Literature and the Native American Experience
Gilliland's (1980) bibliography of children's books on Native Americans repeats the common finding that
although there is no shortage of books about Native Americans, there are very few books by Native
Americans. She noted that many books about Native Americans use loaded vocabulary (e.g., noble and
savage) and stereotypical characters. There were few examples of Native Americans that were not
stereotyped in books for children (Lass-Woodfin, 1978).
Of the 800 titles listed in Stensland's Literature By and About the American Indian (1979), most are
myths, legends, fiction, or biographies. Folktales and legends, the most frequent genre, are traditionally
for adults and often written for older readers. Fiction tends to be predominantly about Navajos and is
often written as if tribes were a people from the eighteenth, nineteenth, and early twentieth centuries.
In most of the fiction and biography, women are absent (Lass-Woodfin, 1978).
Many current books describe Indians participating in rituals and ceremonies. Although this portrays one
aspect of Native American life, there are very few books that go beyond this to deal with other issues.
Jamake Highwater' does go beyond. His writing deals with the spirit world that is an integral part of
Native American life. Anpao (1977) is based in folklore but deals with connections to the earth, other
humans, and the spirit world in a way that goes beyond the usual "folk-rituals" representation.
Highwater's work is unusual--most of the books available about Native Americans continue to be
folktales and legends.
'Although his books do seem to deal authentically with aspects of Native American life, Jamake Highwater is the
subject of some controversy because he is not of Native American descent. He maintains, however, that he has joined the Plains
Indian tribe.
Meyer Reimer
MMultiethnic Literature - 6
Related to the issue of the amount and kind of multiethnic literature being published is the issue of what
cultural and ethnic views students are encountering in their elementary school reading. To address this
issue, I undertook an investigation of the status of multiethnic literature in elementary schools. In the
following section, I describe this investigation.
The Multiethnicity of Literature Used in Schools
For my investigation, I examined trade books and stories in basal reading programs that were
appropriate for third-grade students. I focused on third-grade-level materials, because they tend to
include a significant amount of meaningful text (a story, most often) along with the illustrations. I
examined the appropriate books on three lists of trade books that are widely used by teachers and
parents to select books for children: Jim Trelease's The New Read Aloud Handbook (1989 edition), the
International Reading Association's Children's Choices Award book list (1989 edition), and the list of
suggested books compiled in 1988 by former Secretary of Education William Bennett. I included the
examination of stories from two basal reading programs because some researchers have proposed that
basal reading program publishers may be more aware of the need to include a variety of literature by
members of ethnic groups than are trade book publishing companies (V. J. Harris, personal
communication, April 1989; P. D. Pearson, personal communication, February 1989). I chose the 1989
Houghton-Mifflin basal reading program, which is noted for using trade books as the basis for many of
its stories (Durr, 1989a; 1989b), and the Economy basal program, which is based on a skills approach
to reading instruction (Matteoni, Klein, Sucher, & Welch, 1989a; 1989b). I recorded the ethnic groups
and races of the main characters in each story and tallied the race of all people in the illustrations.
[Insert Table 1 about here.]
None of the 20 stories I randomly sampled from the young- and middle-readers selections of the 1989
Children's Choices list had non-white main characters. There was also little variety in the ethnic
representations in illustrations. Only one book, a story about rap music, contained illustrations of
African-Americans. No other ethnic groups were represented in any of the stories (see Table 1). The
books on Secretary Bennett's list also did not have characters of color. His third-grade list included
many "classics" (which tend to be about whites) and few contemporary publications. (The idea of a
canon of classic literature needs to be dealt with in this age of "cultural literacy," and I will return to this
issue later in this report.) Jim Trelease's popular 1989 list included 51 books listed as appropriate for
the third-grade level. Of the 44 books about people (as opposed to books about animals, space, and
so forth), the main characters and illustrations of people in all were predominantly white.
There were 40 stories in the 3-1 and 3-2 literature-based readers published by Houghton-Mifflin. Six
of these stories did not include any illustrations of people. Twelve stories included mixes of ethnic
groups. All of the other stories in the program included representatives of a single ethnic group-African-American, Hispanic, Asian-American, or Native American. The stories featuring whites
contained representatives of several cultures (European, American, Canadian, Russian).
The skills-based Economy reader included 45 complete stories (9 of which were broken into a number
of different lessons). The 40 stories with human characters contained a higher percentage of white
characters (67%) than did the stories in the Houghton-Mifflin series (50%), and the Economy reader
contained more folktales and stories from different eras of American history to vary the content/type
of story.
These findings suggest that although basal reading program publishers appear to have made a concerted
effort to include ethnic diversity in their stories, students are not seeing much cultural diversity in the
trade books they read at school. These findings raise a number of issues. I address several of these in
the next section.
Meyer Reimer
Multiethnic Literature - 7
Multiethnic Children's Literature: Some Issues
The first issue raised by this examination concerns the predominance of European-American authors
writing about the experience of people of color. Sims (1984) argues that a European-American author
will write from an "outsider's" point of view while an author of color will write from an "insider's" point
of view. The difference in the perspective means there is a difference in what the authors say and how
they say it; indeed, in their purpose for writing. Sims argues that European-American writers tend to
want to socialize and assimilate children into the cultural mainstream--to bridge the minority and
majority cultures--while writers of color want to socialize children into their own cultures, keeping
distinctions between the majority and minority cultures alive. Whether authors want to subsume
different cultures within a "national" culture or make distinctive aspects of each culture clear influences
the literary choices authors make about what to say and how to say it.
The second issue raised, particularly in light of the issue of assimilation and cultural awareness, is that
of clear ethnicity in illustrations. A number of basals have perfected the ethnically nondistinctive child-a child who is a mix of numerous races or ethnic groups rather than carrying the distinctive features of
any one racial group--for their illustrations. In my analyses of basal readers, I found that the children
in some of the illustrations were "unirace" children, as if the publishers were attempting to depict all
people of color without addressing distinguishing differences.
The third issue is hypersensitivity. It seems important to engender sensitivity to other cultures without
losing cultural richness that adds authenticity. A desire to avoid stereotyping can become an excuse to
not deal with multiethnic literature--no book will be "pure" enough. Hypersensitivity can also lead to
"watering down" or removing any cultural traits in literature which, in the end, seems to result in
devaluing cultural diversity rather than valuing and celebrating it.
This issue came to the fore most powerfully in an undergraduate children's literature class I teach when
I shared Jeanette Caines' Just Us Women (1982) with my students. This is a book I enjoy because of
the warm relationship it depicts between a girl and her Aunt Martha who are going on a trip. The class
(which happened to be composed entirely of European-American students) unanimously decided that
this was not an appropriate book to use because Aunt Martha packed fried chicken for lunch and the
girl wore her hair in braids. The students had missed the chance to vicariously experience a wonderful
trip and a satisfying relationship--a pleasure we could all identify with and enjoy--because they worried
about the stereotypes associated with eating fried chicken and having braided hair. My undergraduate
students have also been wary about books that include dialect in the dialogue. Although it is
appropriate to be sensitive to cultural issues and to forego books that do not deal with ethnicity in a
tasteful manner, it should also be appropriate to enjoy cultural distinctiveness in the books we read.
A fourth issue is that of cultural grouping. There needs to be continued awareness about the tendency
to make cultural conglomerates--"Hispanic" meaning any Mexican or Central American culture, or
"Asian" meaning anything from Chinese to Japanese to Filipino. These cultures have great differences,
and some authors do a disservice to learning about the cultures by treating them as though they were
the same.
A fifth issue, alluded to earlier, is that of dealing with the canon of children's literature. The traditional
canon, which includes white characters, contexts, and cultures, need not be eliminated, but broadened
to include books by African-American, Asian-American, Hispanic, and Native American authors.
Children need to be given a wide spectrum of choices of good quality literature for their reading. There
is multiethnic literature such as M. C. Higgins, the Great (Hamilton, 1974) and Dragonwings (Yep, 1975)
that is withstanding the test of time and is a part of the canon that should be available to all children.
The sixth issue is related to the publishing industry. Many of the culturally diverse books that are
published go out of print rapidly (Rollock, 1984). Although mainstream publishers are publishing some
multiethnic literature, the market is small and the number of authors and illustrators limited. One
Meyer Reimer
Multiethnic Literature - 8
publisher, Children's Book Press, has started printing traditional and contemporary stories that are told
by a person native to the culture from which the story comes. Baby Rattlesnake (1989), for example,
is told by Te Ata, a 92-year-old Chickasaw woman. Linda Mononey, herself part Indian, has adapted
it for publishing. Uncle Nacho's Hat (Rohmer, 1989) is a tale from Nicaragua. Multiethnic stories must
be told, written, and published before they can be a resource for students and teachers.
As the rich experiences available through multiethnic literature become a part of teachers' and students'
lives, there will be a demand publishers cannot ignore. Then authors of color will be enticed to share
their stories and to provide for our students a wealth and diversity of literature. To give our students
dreams for the future, books that have characters and illustrations with which they can identify, we must
work for a larger body of multiethnic literature. As Hopkins (1990) says:
It is hard enough in the fledgling beginnings of the 1990s to "hold fast to dreams." If
the dreams do not come--if the hopes, aspirations, thoughts, and feelings of Black
American poets are not written about, how can any of us hold fast? Perhaps it is time
to begin to ponder this loss--to call forward, aggressively nurture newer talents; to be
concerned. (p. 388)
Meyer Reimer
Multiethnic Literature - 9
References
Ata, T. (1989). Baby rattlesnake. San Francisco: Children's Book Press.
Belpre, P. (1960). Perez and Martina. New York: Frederick, Warne.
Belpre, P. (1965). Dance of the animals. New York: Frederick, Warne.
Bennett, W. (1988, September 14). Education Secretary Bennett's suggested reading list for elementaryschool pupils. Chronicle of Higher Education, p. B3.
Bishop, R. S. (1987). Extending multicultural understanding through children's books. In B. Cullinan
(Ed.), Children's literature in the reading program (pp. 60-67). Newark, DE: International
Reading Association.
Bishop, R. S. (1990). Walk tall in the world: African American literature for today's children. Journal
of Negro Education, 59, 556-565.
Bishop, R. S. (1991). African American literature for children: Anchor, compass, and sail. Perspectives,
7, ix-xii.
Boholm-Olsson, E. (1984). Tuan. New York: R & S Books.
Caines, J. (1982). Just us women. New York: Harper & Row.
Chall, J. S., Radwin, E., French, V. W., & Hall, C. R. (1975). Blacks in the world of children's books.
In D. MacCann & G. Woodard (Eds.), The Black American in books for children (2nd ed.)
Metuchen, NJ: Scarecrow Press.
Delacre, L. (1989). Arroz con leche. New York: Scholastic.
Delacre, L. (1990). Las Navidades. New York: Scholastic.
Durr, W. K. (1989a). Caravans. Boston: Houghton-Mifflin.
Durr, W. K. (1989b). Journeys. Boston: Houghton-Mifflin.
Gilliland, H. (1980). Indian children's books. Billings: Montana Council for Indian Education.
Greenfield, E. (1988). Nathaniel talking. New York: Black Butterfly Children's Books.
Hamilton, V. (1974). M. C Higgins, the Great. New York: Macmillan.
Harris, V. J. (1990). African American children's literature: The first one hundred years. Journal of
Negro Education, 59, 540-555.
Highwater, J. (1977). Anpao. New York: Lippincott.
Hopkins, L. B. (1990, July). Letter to the editor. Horn Book Magazine, p. 286.
International Reading Association. (1989). Children's choices for 1989. The Reading Teacher, 43, 51-62.
Meyer Reimer
Multiethnic Literature - 10
Jenkins, E. C., & Austin, M. C. (1987). Literaturefor children about Asians and Asian Americans. New
York: Greenwood Press.
Larrick, N. (1965, September 11). The all-white world of children's books. Saturday Review, pp. 63-65,
84-85.
Lass-Woodfin, M. G. (1978). Books on American Indians and Eskimos. Chicago: American Library
Association.
Lee, J. M. (1987). Ba-Namn.
New York: Holt.
Lord, B. B. (1984). In the year of the boar and Jackie Robinson. New York: Harper & Row.
Matteoni, L., Klein, M., Sucher, F., & Welch, R. (1988a). Bright wonder. Oklahoma City: Economy.
Matteoni, L., Klein, M., Sucher, F., & Welch, R. (1988b). New leaves. Oklahoma City: Economy.
Mills, J. W. (Ed.). (1975). The Black world in literaturefor children. Atlanta: Atlanta University.
New York Public Library. (1989). The Black experience in children's literature. New York.
Nieto, S. (1982a). Children's literature on Puerto Rican themes--Part I: The messages of fiction.
InterracialBooks for Children Bulletin, 14, 6-9.
Nieto, S. (1982b). Children's literature on Puerto Rican themes--Part II: Non-fiction. InterracialBooks
for Children Bulletin, 14, 10-16.
Rollock, B. (1979). The Black experience in children's books. New York: New York Public Library.
Rollock, B. (1984). Th77e Black experience in children's books. New York: New York Public Library.
Rohmer, H. (1989). Uncle Nacho's hat. San Francisco: Children's Book Press.
Schon, I. (1980). A Hispanic heritage. Metuchen, NJ: Scarecrow Press.
Schon, I. (1989). Recent children's books about hispanics. Journalof Youth Services in Libraries, 2, 157162.
Scott, D. H. (1980). Chinese popular literature and the child. Chicago: American Library Association.
Sims, R. (1982). Shadow and substance. Urbana, IL: National Council of Teachers of English.
Sims, R. (1984). A question of perspective. Advocate, 3, 145-155.
Stensland, A. L. (1979). Literature by and about the American Indian (2nd ed.). Urbana, IL: National
Council of Teachers of English.
Trelease, J. (1989). The new read-aloud handbook. New York: Viking Penguin.
Uchida, Y. (1980). Journey home. New York: Atheneum.
Yep, L. (1975). Dragonwings. New York: Harper.
Meyer Reimer
Multiethnic Literature - 11
Author Note
An earlier version of this report appeared in Language Arts. I am indebted to Violet Harris and Diane
Stephens for their helpful critiques during the preparation of the report.
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